


Samwell, MA

by kirani



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic), Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, Coffee Shops, College, Crossover, Falling In Love, First Meetings, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Study Date
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 22:01:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19385473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirani/pseuds/kirani
Summary: Gansey first met him at Annie’s. He recognized the look on his face, that intense glare of concentration to the detriment of anything happening around him. He had been there when Gansey had arrived and he was still sitting there, glaring at his laptop and ignoring his coffee entirely.Or"Gansey goes to Samwell and meets Jack Zimmermann"





	Samwell, MA

**Author's Note:**

> This is 100% the fault of primauomo on tumblr who sent me an ask about Jack Zimmermann and Gansey and it just took on a mind of its own. I was gonna just do a little bullet fic but writer brain said, "no, this will be a full fic with pining and a friends to lovers theme!" so here we are.

Gansey first met him at Annie’s. 

He recognized the look on his face, that intense glare of concentration to the detriment of anything happening around him. 

He had been there when Gansey had arrived and he was still sitting there, glaring at his laptop and ignoring his coffee entirely. 

“You alright?” Gansey asked, standing beside the table but not so close that he loomed. 

The boy looked up in shock, his dark hair flopping on his forehead and his pale blue eyes widening. 

“What?” 

Gansey rubbed a thumb along his lip. 

“You just looked upset. Thought I’d make sure you were okay.”

The boy nodded. 

“I’m fine,” he said. “Thanks.”

Gansey nodded. 

“I think your coffee’s gone cold. Can I get you another?”

The boy furrowed his brow. 

“Nothing untoward, I promise,” Gansey smiled what he knew was a very winning smile. 

The boy seemed unaffected. 

“I’m Gansey,” he offered a hand, which did spur some action on the other boy’s part as he reached up to shake it. 

“Jack.”

“So, coffee?” 

“Why?”

“You look stressed. Thought you could use some company. Get out of your own head for a bit?”

Jack pursed his lips but relaxed after a moment and agreed. 

Gansey got them each a fresh mug of coffee and sat down at Jack’s table with his things. 

“What are you majoring in?” Gansey asked his new friend. 

“History.”

“Me too!” 

A cocked eyebrow. 

“Emphasis in European. You?”

“American.”

They passed some time in silence, each reading their respective homework and sipping their coffee. 

“You know, you look familiar,” Gansey said after a while. 

Jack blushed. 

“Do you play sports or something?”

Jack nodded. “Hockey. I’m the captain of the team here.”

“Ah, that would do it. Captain of the rowing team,” he gestured to himself. “I must have seen you at the meetings.”

“I don’t go,” Jack said, his cheeks still pink. “But I, euh, played in Juniors. And my dad played. So you might know him.”

Gansey shook his head. “Don’t follow NHL. Must have just seen you around campus.”

Jack shrugged. Who gave him the right to be so cute?

“I’ll figure it out,” he waved a hand. “Maybe we took a class together?”

“Probably.”

They fell back into silence. 

It was a nice silence, though. Just enough company to keep him on task and engaged without his mind wandering off. Jack didn’t want anything from him and he didn’t want anything from Jack. It was nice. 

~

He somehow found himself sharing a table with Jack more and more often as the semester progressed. They were both sophomores and they did eventually figure out which class they shared (The Depression in the Americas, which Gansey had taken for fun his second semester partly because he knew it would please Blue). 

Jack got the story of his mother’s political career out of him the third time they studied, as apparently his friend Shitty had recognized the name and bugged him.

Gansey got the story of how Jack ended up at Samwell, though clearly very abridged, their fifth study date. 

(Not that they were dates. Gansey was trying very hard to remember that.)

He ended up coming out to Jack quite on accident but found he didn’t regret it at all. They had been teasing each other about their shared disinterest in dating and Jack had implied that Gansey had never even kissed someone. 

“I’ve kissed people,” Gansey had said, blushing. 

“People?” Jack had cocked an eyebrow calling out the gender-neutral word, and boy was Gansey weak for that eyebrow. 

“People,” Gansey said firmly, leaning into it. 

Jack just nodded. 

It wasn’t the clearest coming out, but Gansey knew it had been one. It felt nice actually, that someone knew. Someone besides Ronan, anyways. He knew, of course, since he was one of the People. 

They moved their study dates to the hockey Haus (Gansey wasn’t sure why it was German but it was) after a while, Jack insisting he needed more space to spread out. 

When one of the hockey freshmen ended up having a panic attack during their second study date at the Haus, Jack handled it in a way that told Gansey he was not new to anxiety. 

“I, euh,” Jack stammered when they were alone again. 

“You don’t have to say anything,” Gansey cut him off. “I get it.”

Jack studied him for a moment then nodded and turned to his homework. 

On a Skype call to Ronan one evening, he had cut off mid-sentence when he realized he had been rambling about Jack for at least ten minutes. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled. 

“You don’t have to apologize for talking about your crush,” Ronan teased. 

“I don’t have a crush!” 

Ronan stared at him until he gave in, dropping his face into his hands. 

“I maybe have a bit of a crush.”

“That’s what I thought. Is he interested?”

Gansey shook his head. “Far as I know, he’s straight.”

“I seriously doubt that,” Ronan laughed. 

Sure enough, the next day, sneaking a glance at Jack to see his adorable concentration face, he found Jack already looking at him. 

He felt his cheeks heat as he watched Jack’s do the same and snapped his attention down to his book. 

It came to a head a week later, a week filled with frustrating stolen glances and heated cheeks, when Jack emerged from his room and joined the rest of the team at a hockey kegster. Gansey had come at Shitty’s invitation and was having a good time but then Jack came down the stairs, ducking under the caution tape, and they had locked eyes.

Gansey was pretty sure he had walked away mid-conversation from someone but couldn’t tell you who.

“You came down,” he said when they met in the middle of the crowded dance floor. 

“Yeah,” Jack agreed, still staring at him. 

“Do you wanna dance?” Gansey asked. 

“I’m a terrible dancer,” Jack said. 

“I’ll teach you,” Gansey smiled.

He fitted his body against Jack’s and slid his arms around the small of his back, pulling them into a rhythm in the mass of bodies. 

Neither of them was particularly good at keeping the beat but he was so high on the closeness of Jack that he didn’t really care. He looked back into Jack’s eyes, daring to slip his gaze down to Jack’s lips before meeting his eyes again. 

He felt drunk on the feeling even though he’d only nursed half a beer all evening.

“Let’s go upstairs,” Jack said, leaning into Gansey’s ear. He didn’t need to be told twice. 

He dragged Jack under the caution tape and up to his room, closing the door and pressing the taller boy against it. 

Gansey paused, checking Jack’s eyes for any sign of unsureness. Jack made a noise of impatience and grabbed at Gansey, pulling him in and kissing him hard. 

When they finally broke apart, Jack was gasping and Gansey could feel his heart pounding in his chest. 

“Wanted to do that for so long,” Jack mumbled, kissing along Gansey’s jaw. 

“Me too,” Gansey gasped.

~

Dating Jack Zimmermann wasn’t much different than being his friend, really. They still had study dates at Annie’s and at the Haus, only now they tangled their feet together under the table. They still texted throughout the day, sharing dumb anecdotes and deep thoughts. They sat by the lake and enjoyed each other’s company in easy silence.

Jack wasn’t keen to be out yet, cautious of his NHL career, and as the son of a politician, Gansey truly understood his need for privacy. So they were out to friends and family but not the world at large. That was just fine with Gansey as it meant he got Jack to himself for the most part. Sure, sometimes they’d get stopped for a photo or autograph, but mostly Samwell students left Jack alone. 

And when they were alone? Jack’s full attention on him was heady. He was a focused guy already, working hard to accomplish his goals on the ice and in the classroom. But when he was with Gansey, all that attention was focused on him alone. 

He learned Gansey’s body like it was his job, figuring out how to draw noises from him that Gansey hadn’t even known he could make. Gansey just tried to keep up. 

Neither of them had been in a real relationship since high school, Jack with a teammate in juniors (Gansey hadn’t asked for details and Jack hadn’t offered any), and Gansey with Blue (before they had decided that platonic love was really more their thing and girls were more of Blue’s thing). 

They were studying now, sitting at the kitchen table in the Haus with their ankles hooked around each other. 

“I wanted to ask you something,” Jack said after a while working in silence. 

Gansey set down his pen and looked up at him. 

“Will you be my boyfriend?” Jack asked, his cheeks coloring. 

Gansey grinned. 

“So formal,” he teased. 

Jack shrugged.

“Yes, you goof. I would like that.”

“Good,” Jack smiled in relief. He stood up halfway from his chair and leaned over the table to kiss Gansey. He hummed into this kiss. 

“Boyfriend. I like that a lot.”

Jack kissed him again then sat back down. He laced his fingers through Gansey’s and acted like he was going to just go back to his homework. 

Gansey laughed and pulled Jack up from the table, abandoning their assignments as he dragged his boyfriend upstairs.

**Author's Note:**

> i'm on tumblr at willdexpoindexter for omgcp and blueseyforthesoul for trc  
> [the post that started it all](https://willdexpoindexter.tumblr.com/post/185892452921/a-i-love-u-b-jack-and-gansey-fic-i-think-theyd)


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